Running Up

A look at junior high kids running (and winning) on the high school level

Two years ago, when Maddox Patterson first ran with the high school cross country team at the Sayre School in Lexington, Ky., she was actually just a seventh-grader at the private institution’s middle school.

It’s not that the Spartans needed runners to fill out their top seven, it’s that Patterson, then just 12, was good enough to be one of the school’s top runners. As it turns out, she was one of the state’s top runners, too.

She started that season logging 15 miles per week, usually by running three to four times a week. Her natural talent and modest training made her unbeatable against seventh- and eighth-graders in the greater Lexington area. After not losing a single middle school race during the regular season, coach Connie Cornelius approached Maddox and her parents about bumping her up to the varsity.

She turned heads by winning the regional meet in her varsity debut and then pulled off a bigger shocker by wining the 5K race at the 1A state championship in 19:42. She continued her strong running in track with a second-place finish in the 3200m and a third in the 1600m. Then, as an eighth-grader, she absolutely dominated her high school season, winning 10 out of 11 races (with nine course records) and another 1A state title in 18:23.

“Maddox rose to the top of the cross country world in half a season, shocking herself, her teammates and her competitors,” Cornelius says.

In a handful of states, including Kentucky and Florida, it’s within the rules for middle school and junior high school students to participate on high school sports teams. It might sound unlikely that an eighth-grade boy plays football for the varsity team of the high school he’ll attend the following year, or a seventh-grade girl becomes the starting point guard on a high school team with teammates who might be six years her elder.

But it’s becoming more and more common for pre-teen runners to join high school cross country and track teams before their eighth-grade graduation. And that’s especially so at the parochial and private schools, which aren’t governed by district rules that might prohibit younger kids from joining high school teams.

The concept of “running up” is a controversial topic for several reasons. First, there’s the delicate issue of how much a pre-teen student should be running. Next there’s the vast difference in mental and emotional maturity between teammates, who might range in age from 11 to 18. Plus, there’s the notion that a pre-high-school runner is taking away an opportunity of a runner who might have been on the team for several years and worked hard to earn a place on the varsity team.

Each of those came into play with Patterson, even though her parents and Cornelius were careful to keep her mileage low and to make the transition as smooth as possible.

“Her quick rise caused initial strain on our girls team, as every Sayre high school girl runner who had been running for years was shifted down a notch due to a seventh-grader,” Cornelius admits.

Even though Patterson was able to compete physically, she had a hard time connecting socially. Understandably, it’s hard for a 12-year-old to relate to a junior or senior teammate who has a driver’s license, a teenage social life and college choices on the horizon.

“Maddox and the high school girls in the beginning struggled to connect,” Cornelius says, “because Maddox did not know their high school teachers, wasn't looking at colleges, wasn't interested in dating boys and, actually, didn't even know the other area competitors. Plus, Maddox is very shy initially.”

Now a freshman in high school, Patterson has continued to shine. She’s won four meets this fall and finished 19th in the ultra-competitive Great American Cross Country Festival in North Carolina, but she’s also become a team leader and hopes to lead the team to a state title.

"Maddox hopes to improve her 5K time this season and will have many opportunities to do that with the impressive competition she will be toeing the line with this season, both in and outside of Kentucky," Cornelius said earlier this year. "Maddox would also like to help her team compete at the state meet. She is truly a team player, and though she has her own individual goals, she prides herself most on what her team has accomplished."